Related papers: Albert Einstein - a Pious Atheist
Einstein's 1935 critique of quantum mechanics is often associated with the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) argument, yet his private correspondence from that year reveals a more exact conceptual structure guiding his claim that the…
Relativity was Einstein's main research program and scientific project. It was an open-ended program that developed throughout Einstein's scientific career, giving rise to special relativity, general relativity and unified field theory. In…
Feyerabend frequently discussed physics. He also referred to the history of the subject when motivating his philosophy of science. Alas, as some examples show, his understanding of physics remained superficial. In this respect, Feyerabend…
In the history of physics 1905 can be considered as the year of Einstein's proclamation of independence of events. Indeed the concept of independent events occupies a essential place in the three main 1905 Einstein's papers (quanta of…
Monotheistic religions such as Judaism and Christianity affirm that God loves all humans and created them in His image. However, we have learned from Darwin that we were not created separately from other life on earth. Some Christians…
In 1905 Einstein presented the Clock Paradox and in 1911 Paul Langevin expanded Einstein's result to human observers, the "Twin Paradox." I will explain the crucial difference between Einstein and Langevin. Einstein did not present the…
We discuss various space-time metrics which are compatible with Einstein's equations and a previously suggested cosmology with a finite total mass. In this alternative cosmology the matter density was postulated to be a spatial delta…
The intimate relations between Einstein's equation, conformal geometry, geometric asymptotics, and the idea of an isolated system in general relativity have been pointed out by Penrose many years ago. A detailed analysis of the interplay of…
I argue that Immanuel Kant's critical philosophy -- in particular the doctrine of transcendental idealism which grounds it -- is best understood as an `epistemic' or `metaphilosophical' doctrine. As such it aims to show how one may engage…
Astronomy is a precise and relatively simple science because objects accelerate in a gravitational field at the same rate, irrespective of their composition. Galileo knew this, and Einstein took it as the basis for general relativity.…
Since I first became enthralled with physics as a teenager, I've been intrigued by the philosophical aspects of the discipline. As I approached the end of my career as an experimental physicist and observational astronomer (I'm now…
In 1686 in his Discours de Metaphysique, Leibniz points out that if an arbitrarily complex theory is permitted then the notion of "theory" becomes vacuous because there is always a theory. This idea is developed in the modern theory of…
Duerer's engraving ``MELENCOLIA I'' was circulated in two versions not previously distinguished. Besides their conspicuous early Renaissance scientific instruments and tools, they contain numerous apparently unreported concealments whose…
Imagining what life on other planets, and intelligent life in particular, may be like is a long-running theme in human culture. It is a manifestation of the innate human curiosity about the Cosmos, and it has inspired numerous works of art…
We present some historical and philosophical reflections on the paper "On the Relation Between the Expansion and the Mean Density of the Universe", published by Albert Einstein and Willem de Sitter in 1932. In this famous work, Einstein and…
The Einstein postulates assert an invariance of the propagation speed of light in vacuum for any observer, and which amounts to a presumed absence of any preferred frame. The postulates appear to be directly linked to relativistic effects…
The analytic hyperbolic geometric viewpoint of Einstein's special theory of relativity is presented.
The author reflects on the significance of Einstein's brain and the search for what makes it distinct.
I argue that Einstein overlooked an important aspect of the relativity of time in never quite realizing his quest to embody Mach's principle in his theory of gravity. As a step towards that goal, I broaden the Strong Equivalence Principle…
Einstein's static model is the first relativistic cosmological model. The model is static, finite and of spherical spatial symmetry. I use the solution of Einstein's field equations in a homogeneous and isotropic universe -- Friedmann's…